Speaking of which, there is one thing that all great content marketing operations have in common: they start with keyword research. Choose the right keyword and you may even get away with mediocre content and still get great SEO results. Choose the wrong keyword and you’re doomed from the start.

Here is a guide to choosing keywords for SEO campaigns with a structured process rather than relying on guesswork and assumptions.

Step 1: Determine Your Goal and the Right Keyword Choice Will Come

Not all keywords are created equal. When you take a look at keywords that people search for when they find your website (in Google Analytics or Google Search Console), you can probably spot patterns. Some keywords drive visitors who want to purchase, and other keywords bring visitors who want to read and get educated.

With that in mind, it’s important to determine the marketing goals you want to achieve with your content marketing initiative. What I like to do is sort content into four buckets:

• Solution unaware
• Solution aware
• Product unaware
• Product aware

Each of these four content buckets attracts a different type of audience and has a different overall purpose. Once you determine what type of readers you want to attract and what kind of action you want to drive, you can then go on to choose your ideal keyword(s) and create a keyword list for content creation.

One keyword cannot possibly be ideal for stages of the sales funnel and for all parts of your audience. It would be like trying to cut a steak with a butter knife – because it’s technically a knife.

Determine your content marketing goal first, be it:

• Getting more organic traffic from a search query
• Converting more visitors into free trial users
• Converting more free trial users into paying customers
• Increasing brand awareness and stealing traffic/leads from your customers
• And more.

Once you know the end goal, choosing a keyword becomes that much easier. Don’t worry though – as you gain more experience with keyword research (and your niche and industry), it becomes much easier to determine what kind of keyword is suitable for which digital marketing goal.

Step 2: Look at the Keyword Competition

If you’re in product, finding out what your competitors are working on is virtually impossible. You’ll never know if they’re working on launching new features, updating their existing ones, fixing UX or doing something else. 

Content marketing lets you find out everything your competitors are doing because it’s out in the open. Just load up your favorite SEO tool (like SearchAtlas) and you can see everything you need. If you’re tight on budget, you can use free tools such as Google Trends and Google Keyword Planner instead.

That means keywords too. With just a glance at the Competitor Research tool in SearchAtlas, you can see all of the keywords your competitors are ranking for. Just a few clicks is enough to show you their top pages in terms of organic search traffic and the keywords they’re optimized for.

While this is not the end-all strategy, it’s a great starting point as it will show you if you’re going in the right direction with a web page or not. Copying your competitors is not a viable long-term keyword and content strategy so use competitor research as a basis to determine what you can do better.

Many times, when doing keyword research you’ll spot opportunities in cases where your competitors are trying to rank for a keyword. You’ll easily figure out when you can do better and create a blog post that is more valuable for your readers.

Sometimes, the competitors are performing better simply because they have a higher domain authority and more backlinks.

Step 3: Evaluate the Keyword Metrics

To find the ideal keyword, you’ll first have to sift through a bunch of those which are not exactly ideal. And to determine whether they’re a good fit, you need to look at their metrics. These include:

• Monthly search volume (how many people search for a keyword per month on average)
• Keyword difficulty (how difficult it is to rank in the top 10 for a keyword on a scale from 0 to 100)
• Search intent (how likely someone is to make a purchase or get to some other type of conversion based on what most people look for in the search results.
  Bonus:
• Cost per click for PPC ads (the higher the cost, the more valuable the keyword is in terms of conversions)
• Clicks (if a keyword has significantly more searches than clicks – that means that the person searching can find all the information from the search alone and doesn’t click through to the results)
• Global search volume (sometimes a keyword has low search volume in the USA but has lots of searches globally – making it a good target)

Ideally, you want a lot of search volume, a low keyword difficulty, and a high intent to purchase. This brings us to our next point.

Step 4: Realize that There Are No Perfect Keywords

Finding a keyword that meets all the criteria above is like finding a needle in a haystack. If a keyword has a nice search volume and a good likelihood to drive conversions, it’s likely going to have a very high keyword difficulty.

On the other hand, if a keyword is highly likely to drive new purchases, it’s probably not going to have a very high search volume.

In other words (pardon the pun), you’ll often be forced to make compromises because it rarely happens that one keyword phrase meets all the criteria to be ideal.

The sooner you realize that choosing keywords for SEO is a big game of compromise, the better. The important thing is to keep in mind that each type of keyword drives different results so it’s perfectly fine if a long tail keyword has a search volume of 50 if it’s easy to rank for.

Also, you’ll pick up a bunch of secondary keywords with that one, as long as you write a high-quality piece. And even more importantly, if many of those 50 visitors become customers, then it’s a superb choice.

Step 5: Think About the Topic Cluster As Part of your SEO Strategy

When we create a content plan for an upcoming month or quarter at Whatagraph, we never choose keywords in isolation. Instead, we open up our keyword tool and take a look at topic clusters so that we can cover a bigger topic in more detail.

For example, we recently wrote about Google Data Studio in our Google Data Studio review, making it the central piece of content for this topic cluster. While this is an important keyword to cover, there are also other, related ones where we could cover the topic in depth even more and meet the user intent even better.

For example, we decided to write a bunch of other articles in the meantime, including those about:

• Google Data Studio pricing
• Google Data Studio connectors
• Google Data Studio customer service
• And others

In short, we realized that the main keyword satisfies one type of search intent and that there are other opportunities for keywords that deserve their own pieces. When you’re researching keywords and find one that is hugely relevant to your business, don’t just settle on one piece – dig deeper for related opportunities and create a topic cluster so that your searcher has all the details in one place.

You can also use competitor analysis tools from LinkGraph to find topic cluster opportunities. One great way of doing this is by following the internal links on relevant competitor pieces to see what kind of related topics they cover.

Step 6: Consider Topical Authority in Search Engine Results

Consider the keywords you choose as making small choices that eventually have a larger impact on your target audience. I like to think of it as spending an hour a day in the gym, only to be able to lift massive weights in 6 months.

Let’s explain. Topical authority means that with the content you write, you establish yourself as an authority on a certain topic because you cover a variety of subtopics.

In simpler terms, a website like Whatagraph has lots of different articles on marketing reporting and marketing KPIs. If we were to publish a new article on a marketing reporting tool tomorrow, it would rank more quickly and easily in the top 10 compared to a website that creates content around CRMs, for example.

In other words, search engines consider you an authority on the topic once you cover it with many different subtopics. Moreover, once you cover an entire cluster, rather than writing a one-off article, you provide answers to a large number of potential questions your target audience may have. 

If you’re just starting out with a certain topic, you’ll have a much harder time ranking for a keyword compared to a website that has 50+ articles on similar topics spanning over several years.

Each new keyword you choose should be a part of a bigger plan to achieve topical authority. As you create more content, it becomes easier with each new piece to successfully rank it. Moreover, you’ll have a wealth of internal linking opportunities.

Final Thoughts on Choosing Keywords for SEO

If you’ve followed all the steps so far, you probably know how to find an amazing keyword for your next piece of content. If not, you have an excellent idea on how to get started with keyword research. With the right keywords and the right keyword tool, you’ll not only have an easy time ranking in the SERPs, but you’ll also become the star of your marketing team. Good luck with the research and writing!

About the Author: Mile Zivkovic is the Head of Content at Whatagraph, a marketing reporting tool used by top agencies and in-house marketing teams.

The post Choosing Keywords for SEO: A 6-Step Guide appeared first on LinkGraph.

Here is a breakdown of the importance of keyword tracking to your SEO strategy, how to choose a keyword tracking software, and some top keyword tracking softwares used by SEO professionals and digital marketers today.

What is Keyword Tracking?

Keyword tracking is the process of using software tools to monitor the organic keywords your website ranks for in search engine results. It also involves tracking the ranking positions for those keywords and monitoring how those rankings change over time.  

But keyword tracking is not just about watching your keywords and hoping something good happens. Instead, the right keyword tracking tools will provide important data and metrics that offer insights into how to grow and scale your web presence in Google. 

Your ideal keyword goal should be to rank in the number one position in the (SERPs) for the keywords that your target audience is using. However, certain keywords are more competitive than others. Other site owners will try to improve their content in order to outrank your brand.

As a result, you should constantly monitor your ranking fluctuations in order to respond when your ranking positions decrease or when your content stops being promoted entirely.

Why Keyword Tracking Matters to Successful SEO

To understand exactly why keyword tracking is an important factor within a successful SEO campaign, it’s critical to understand how the SERPs work, how target keywords tie into rankings, and the most important keyword metrics you’ll want to monitor.

How Do Search Engines Work?

Search engines work by crawling all the web pages on the Internet and then reading, categorizing, and indexing them into a large database. While there are a ton of different technical elements to a website that can make it easier for the search engine bots to find you, the keywords you include on your web pages help the bots understand the content on your web pages and whether or not to promote them in the SERPs.

Similarly, users rely on keywords when searching for new content or information about products and services. But users don’t always search the same way. There are a variety of keywords they might use to find relevant content. If your web pages provide high-quality information or answers to the questions users are asking, Google is more likely to promote it to users. 

How Do Keywords Tie Into SERP Rankings?

As mentioned before, your keywords are ideas and topics that define what your content and web pages are all about. They are a fundamental part of SEO. When used properly, keywords drive organic traffic to your website and can make or break your business. 

The more often that you create useful, informative content, the more opportunities you’ll have to get your brand name in front of potential customers by showing up in Google searches for relevant keyword queries.

Common Keyword Metrics

There are a few common keyword metrics that SEOs or site owners use to determine which keywords they want to rank for. They include: 

• • Search Volume: This is the number of monthly searches a keyword receives
  • CPC: This is the price advertisers pay per click to target the keyword in Google Ads. High CPCs are a sign of strong conversion potential.
  • Keyword Difficulty: The competitive landscape of the keyword. Higher keyword difficulty scores mean more competition to rank.

Site owners often aim to rank for keywords that have higher search volume and stronger conversion potential. A smart SEO strategy will also include keywords that a brand can realistically rank for so they can start ranking and driving clicks sooner.

Types of Keyword Search Intent

In addition to the above metrics, search intent also plays into the value of keywords. Stronger search intent can mean a greater need for rank tracking.

The four ways that SEOs usually categorize search intent are:

• Informational: Keyword searchers where the user is looking for information.
• Navigational: When a searcher is looking for a specific web page or website.
• Transactional: Searchers where the user is looking to make a purchase.
• Commercial: Keyword searchers where the user is looking for information that will help them make a purchase decision

Keyword searches that fall into the latter two categories of search intent are often more competitive because they have higher economic value. For businesses who use SEO to grow sales and revenue, they’ll more likely want to track keywords that fall into those categories.

What Metrics Should I Monitor When Rank Tracking?

Once you optimize your content for your target keywords and publish it on your site, there are four metrics to keep an eye on when rank tracking. They include:

• Total Keywords: This is the total number of different keywords that a web page ranks for in the SERPs
• Current Position: The ranking position of a web page for a specific keyword query
• Average Position: This is the average ranking position of a web page across all of the keywords that it ranks for in Google 
• Rank Change: This is the number of positions gained or lost since the previous day or the previous rankings update

By using all of these factors to monitor and track your keywords, you’ll be better equipped to hone in on your strategy and promote successful SEO.

How Often Should You Track Your Keyword Rankings?

Arguably, of any marketing element, keywords are the most volatile and change the most often. So much so, that a keyword’s ranking can change within hours and minutes. This makes it necessary to monitor them often.

But each business is different. The word “often” can be subjective. There are a lot of factors to consider when deciding how to monitor your keyword rankings. Our rule of thumb is the more organic clicks that a keyword drives to your website, the more frequently you should check your ranking position for that keyword.

Why? Because for some keywords, a change in rank position can mean hundreds, if not thousands, of fewer clicks to your website.

For beginner mid-sized businesses and those just getting off the ground in terms of content production, we recommend first giving your content time to be promoted on Google. On average, it can take Google up to 90 days to find, crawl, and index your web pages. If you are only starting out with your content implementation, have some patience. 

Until Google has been able to find your page, there won’t be much movement in your rankings, so sit tight. Give the search engine time to crawl and index, and once you have been found, we recommend checking your rankings on a regular basis every week. 

But for larger, more established websites, keyword rankings should be checked on a daily basis. Because when a keyword is high-performing (meaning strong conversion-potential), other site owners will dedicate a lot of time optimizing their content to rank on page 1. 

Just because you earn a top rankings spot doesn’t mean you’ll stay there.

Getting Started With Keyword Rank Tracking

Just as you wouldn’t jump right into any other part of your content marketing strategy, you’ll need to have a game plan when it comes to your keyword rank tracking. Here are some steps that will help you get started.

1. Determine Your Most Important Keywords

The first step is to decide what keywords are the most important for your business. That list can include keywords driving traffic to your website right now and those keywords that you hope to rank for in the future.

Are you earning lots of organic clicks from a specific keyword? Do you earn more conversions from specific queries? If the answer is yes, you’ll want to make sure your content stays in top positions for those keyword terms.

2. Identify Key Position Opportunities

Although the ultimate goal is always to rank in position 1, this is not always realistic. This is epecially true when vying for the more competitive keywords in your niche. But because higher ranking positions have higher CTRs, just one position improvement for a keyword can mean loads of additional traffic to your website. 

So in addition to the important keywords, you’ll also want to identify keyword position improvements that present huge organic traffic opportunities for your website. You’ll have to improve the quality of your content and page experience of the pages targeting those keywords to see changes in position. But, you’ll want to have those keywords clearly identified so you can include them in your keyword tracking. 

This is particularly true for SEOs or digital marketers providing SEO services to clients. If one keyword position change produces huge influxes of traffic for a client, you’ll want to make sure you show it in your keyword tracking reports.

3. Choose a Keyword Rank Tracker

What rank tracker you choose will depend on the features that are most helpful to your own SEO strategy. Not all keyword rank tracker tools have the same accuracy or features. That’s why you’ll want to make sure that the software you ultimately choose provides the ranking data you need to stay on top of your keyword rankings and positions.

What Makes a Quality Keyword Tracking Software?

Remember, you want your keyword tracking software to work for you. So for the best results, the best rank tracker should include the metrics and functionalities you need in an easy-to-find place. The tool should also provide  easily comprehensible data.

When looking for a rank tracker tool, you’ll want to ask yourself the following questions to ensure it is a good fit for your needs:

• Does this software track 100% of your site’s keyword rankings?
• How often are the keyword positions updated? 
• Do I have to pay extra for tracking more keywords? 
• Does the software include historical data so I can see all keyword positions since Google first indexed pages on my website?
• Does the software allow me to generate keyword reports, and are they helpful?
• Are there metrics to help me estimate how my rank changes will impact my organic traffic?
• Can I track rankings for different countries or geographic areas?
• What’s the total number of keywords that I track at once?
• Can I monitor my direct competitor’s keyword rankings and performance?
• Can I set up alerts for my most important keywords?

Most Important Rank Tracking Features

You might not be able to answer yes to all of those questions based on your current keyword tracking software. 

However, there are some absolute musts that you will want to prioritize in order to do keyword rank tracking in the most impactful way.

1. Number of Keywords

For small businesses with only one primary service or product, you may not need a rank tracking software that provides position tracking for every single keyword your website ranks for.

But for enterprise organizations or digital marketing agencies, having 100% of your keyword data can be the difference between proving the value of SEO efforts to key stakeholders or clients.

Not all keyword tracking software provides comprehensive keyword tracking, and some charge higher prices for more additional keywords. Make sure you choose a software that provides access to as many keywords as possible.

2. Daily Position Updates

Imagine this experience. Your keyword tracking software states your web page is in position 4 for a high value keyword in your industry. But then, when you type that keyword into Google, your page is showing up in position 11?

That’s likely because your current keyword tracking software doesn’t have daily position updates. Some keyword tracking softwares only provide daily updates for keywords with higher search volumes, meaning keyword position data can be backdated by weeks, and sometimes even months.

If you are in a highly competitive market or a niche industry with keywords with lower search volume, delayed position updates can be very problematic and prevent you from responding to rankings drops promptly and effectively.

3. SERP Scraping or Google Data

The above two features are predicated on one primary factor: Whether your rank tracking software uses SERP scraping to gather data or uses Google’s API. 

Some keyword rank tracking software uses bots to scrape the SERPs and gather position information. Most of these softwares don’t have the capability to scrape the SERPs for every keyword every day.

Google, however, has the most complete keyword dataset in the world. If your keyword tracking software is using Google data, that means you can see more keywords and see changes on a daily basis.

Keyword Tracking Tools for Site Owners

Based on the above features, here are three different rank and position tracking tools that meet most of the above criteria. They vary from completely free to a higher price point. But they offer a range of features that empower site owners to make the most of keyword rank tracking.

Google Search Console

Google Search Console is the original keyword tracking software. This free platform gives site owners a nice introduction to keyword tracking and its importance to SEO. 

In addition to keyword tracking, this platform helps site owners troubleshoot page experience issues. You can also use it to monitor mobile usability, submit disavow files, and see your backlinks.

Best Features of Google Search Console

• The World’s largest SEO dataset: No other rank tracking platform has as much keyword data as Google. If you want to see every single keyword your website ranks for – this is the place to do it.
• Impressions Data: An impression happens every time a user sees your SERP result, even if they don’t click on it. Not all keyword tracking softwares include impressions data, but they can be a useful metric for benchmarking your SEO strategy.
• Daily Updates: Google updates keyword rankings data for your website on a daily basis. If there are any rankings changes that might significantly impact your site traffic, you can know almost immediately with this free platform.

Unfortunately, Google’s keyword tracking platform isn’t the most user friendly and is pretty bare bones in terms of UI/UX. It is free, after all, so it’s no surprise that there are no advanced features here. 

But in terms of accuracy and real-time position information, nothing can beat the power of Google’s platform.

GSC Insights by SearchAtlas

Ideal for enterprise websites and agencies, GSC Insights is one of the most comprehensive keyword tracking platforms. Because the tool is built over Google’s API, it provides the same daily updates and data as Google Search Console, but with more advanced features and data visualizations.

By linking GSC Insights with your Google Search Console account, you can have a fresh look on your keywords ranking data. The data representations that GSC Insights includes help you not only track your keyword rankings, but make insightful decisions for improvement. 

In addition to daily updates and full impressions data, GSC Insights also has these additional features.

Best Features of GSC Insights

• Total Keyword History: See the total keywords your website has ranked for overtime. Although Google Search Console tells you all your data, it doesn’t chart total keyword rankings, only total clicks and impressions.
• Overall Rank Change: Shows you the total number of position changes across all of your keywords. This is a great feature to see the impact of sitewide optimizations like link building or page experience improvements.
• Full historical Data: GSC Insights charts all of your historical keyword data for a web page in one easily viewable chart.
• Traffic and CTR by Rank Position: This feature can help site owners identify which keywords have the most untapped organic traffic. This feature shows average CTR and total organic traffic by position, meaning all of the keywords where your web pages rank in position 1, position, 2 and so on.
• Keyword Cannibalization: Sometimes, you may have multiple web pages that rank for the same keyword. This happens when Google doesn’t know which page to promote. This feature identifies which pages are cannibalizing each other so you can resolve it.

For those who really want to leverage the power of keyword data to improve their SEO, GSC Insights is the ideal platform for position tracking. With various subscription levels, site owners and digital marketers can find the level that fits best for their team.

Moz Rank Tracker

Moz’s Rank Tracker offers a very simple and straightforward keyword rank tracking platform. For non-SEOs or beginners to keyword tracking, Rank Tracker offers only the high-level metrics you absolutely need to understand whether your SEO performance is improving or not.

However, because Moz relies on SERP scraping to gather keyword ranking data, they only offer 300 keywords to track, and upcharge for an additional 200 keywords. As a result, this rank tracking software is a better option for smaller sites or local businesses with less robust content or keyword goals.

Additional Features of Moz Rank Tracker:

• Easy On-Boarding: Get started with Rank Tracker quickly with an easy on-boarding process to start tracking your keywords
• Multiple Search Engines: If your brand is also focused on performing well in other search engines besides Google, Moz Rank Tracker provides keyword rankings and positions data for Bing, Yahoo, and Google Mobile as well
• On-Demand Daily Keyword Checks: For an additional cost, Rank Tracker provides additional on-demand query checks so you can see the positions for the keywords that are most important or relevant to your strategy right now.

Conclusion

Every site owner executing an SEO strategy should be engaging in regular keyword tracking. Staying on top of keyword positions can be the difference between maintaining your organic web traffic or losing out on significant sales or lead generation.

All of the above keyword tracking softwares have trial versions of their tools so you can see which one is the right fit for you business or SEO strategy. When done well, keyword tracking can help you achieve more success and maintain your top positions well into the future.

The post Keyword Tracking: How to Choose a Rank Tracking Software appeared first on LinkGraph.

However, when combining organic traffic SEO strategies in addition to PPC campaigns, there are ways to get more out of your efforts and budget. For example, precision targeting within your niche with a carefully constructed negative keyword list can help you get the most of your PPC campaign without breaking the bank. 

Of course, this involves understanding how to find the best negative keywords for your business and how to input them correctly into Google Ads. That’s where this article comes in. We’ll answer the most common questions related to negative keywords, including how negative keywords different from other keywords.

What Are Keywords vs. Negative Keywords?

Just as keywords are pivotal to gaining search traffic, negative keywords are essential for targeting the right traffic through your SEO campaign. While similar in their nature, keywords and negative keywords function differently. This section will explain how.

A Closer Look at Keywords

In SEO, keywords are defined as the words or string of words that searchers enter into search bars. Search queries are comprised of keywords. Conducting keyword research is one of the primary steps to developing an optimization strategy. If you have experience with SEO campaigns of any kind, chances are high that you are a bit familiar with keywords. 

If you have yet to initiate a search engine optimization campaign, it’s important to understand the metrics surrounding keywords as well as search intent.

Why Do Keywords Matter?

Keywords are an excellent tool for digital marketers to determine the target audience for a specific company or brand. They offer insights regarding who is most interested in a company’s products and services and what drives that interest. 

Thorough keyword research allows you to build a highly accurate customer persona and an understanding of that persona’s search intent. 

Types of Keywords

There are many different types of keywords, including

• Short-tail keywords
• Long-tail keywords
• Geo-targeted keywords
• Short-term fresh keywords
• Broad match keywords or related
• Negative keywords
• Related questions & targeted intent keywords

What are negative keywords?

As implied, negative keywords are what you do not want searchers to find your website for in relation to a pay-per-click campaign. Sometimes, negative keywords are referred to as “negative matches.”

This type of keyword actively prevents your ad from being triggered by a particular phrase or word in a search query. When you implement a negative keyword, Google Ads will not show your ad to anyone searching for that word or phrase.

For example, Suppose you add “luxury” as a negative keyword to your ad group or campaign. In that case, you will be telling Google Ads to exclude your advertisement from search results, should a searcher use the word “luxury” in their query.

What Are the Benefits of Using Negative Keywords?

1. Drive higher-quality traffic to your site

When adequately utilized, negative keywords can help you budget your Google Ad campaign for only the best quality searches. A high-quality search is determined by its potential to generate leads out of website visitors.

2. Negative keywords maximize your Google Ads budget

Negative keywords can save your budget from pricey clicks. Since Google structures its pay-per-click structure on a cost-per-click (CPC), you can avoid those words that will drain your budget more rapidly.

3. Mitigate a higher bounce rate

When a searcher clicks on your ad, but immediately backs out, you still pay for that click, and Google registers that back out into your bounce rate, a Google ranking factor. Your website’s bounce rate refers to the volume of searchers who enter your website but return back to the search results before navigating to another web page. 

For example: 

If you sell pool cleaning supplies, you may find that searchers looking for pool table supplies for billiards are driving up your bounce rate and using up your PPC campaign budget. By omitting “pool table” and “pool” from your campaign, you can increase the quality of your traffic.

By avoiding showing up as an off-topic search result, you can avoid an overly high bounce rate and save money on your SEO campaign. This is a huge benefit to smaller businesses and companies.

4. Form a better strategic SEO campaign

Bidding on the best keywords in your industry niche can be challenging. Sometimes, a strategic SEO approach is more lucrative than an expensive one.

Many campaigns choose to circumnavigate the competition by focusing on poorly utilized long-tail keywords. This tactic is comparable to the use of negative keywords because it requires narrowing your reach a bit. Still, the newly sharpened scope may reach the members of your target audience that are most likely to engage with your company meaningfully.

Negative Keyword Types and How to Use Them

Understanding what negative keywords are is just the first step in forming better PPC campaigns. You also need to know the various types of negatives and how to employ them in your Google Ads campaigns.

1. Campaign-level negative keywords

Campaign-level negative keywords essentially tell Google never to show your advertisements or content when the keyword is input as a search query. This particular type of negative keyword comes in handy for businesses that cater to a highly specific niche or only offer a certain kind of product or service. 

For instance, suppose you run a business that fixes jewelry and watches, but you do not sell or buy any jewelry in the store. In that case, you may choose to negative search queries containing the keywords “buy jewelry” and “sell jewelry” so that you save your advertising for only searchers looking to “fix jewelry.” If you do not want your advertisements, website, or content to show up in any given search, a campaign-level negative is the best route to take.

2. Ad Group-level negatives

Ad Group-level negative keywords are less absolute than their campaign-level counterparts. While campaign-level negatives apply to all ads within the campaign, ad group-level negatives can be enforced for only the selected ad group. 

Ad groups share a set of target keywords, audience members, and bids. Adding negative keywords to a specific ad group ensures the group will not show ads to irrelevant queries in their pre-selected cohort.

3. Negative Broad Match Keywords

Negative broad match keywords are regarded as the default types of negative keywords. When using a negative broad match, your ad will not show if the search query contains all the chosen negative keyword terms, regardless of the order they appear. The ad may still show if the searcher’s query has only a few of your negative broad match keyword terms.

For example:

Suppose your negative broad match keyword is “ski goggles.” In that case, your ads will not show to searchers requesting “ski goggles” or “goggles ski.” However, your ads may still show if the search query is “pink swim goggles” or the single form “ski goggle.”

4. Negative Phrase Match Keywords

Negative phrase matches are the types of negative keywords to use when you want to exclude an exact phrase. Using negative phrase match keywords ensures that Google will exclude your ads in any queries wherein a searcher uses the chosen keywords in the exact order you chose them.

The query may include additional irrelevant keywords, but your ad will not be presented to the searcher as long as the chosen phrase match keywords are in order. 

Using the example above, ads will not be shown for queries like “kids ski goggles.” or “anti-fog ski goggles.” Conversely, users requesting search results for “goggles to ski” or “blue goggles ski” may still be shown your ads because the list of negative keywords is out of order.

5. Negative Exact Match Keywords

Negative exact match keywords are the most selective and specific of all types of negative keywords. When using exact match keywords, your ads will not show if the search contains the exact keywords in the correct order, with no additional words or irrelevant keywords interfering. 

However, your ad will likely still show if the query includes your exact match keywords with extra words. Variations of your exact match negative keyword like “ski goggle” or even “purple ski goggles” will still pull your ads for the search results.

How can I use negative keywords effectively in my SEO campaign?

Negative keywords are excellent means of precision-targeting your most desirable audience members. When used correctly, negative keywords can save your search campaigns a lot of money. Negative keywords help ads focus on queries with only the highest relevancy. 

Nonetheless, it is a good idea to choose your keywords with caution not to alienate potential customers. 

Forming your negative keyword list

When it comes to creating a negative keyword list, you often have to test out Google and put yourself in the mindset of searchers. But, you don’t have to approach your list without guidelines. Here are some techniques you can use to tailor your list to your business’s needs:

1. Test Extra-Long-Tail Keywords

When devising a new keyword list, it is vital to remember that negative keywords do not match close variants. In other words, your ad may still be visible on the search results page in response to queries that contain close variants of your chosen negative keywords. 

It may be beneficial to examine the outcome in the event that a searcher uses an extraordinarily long-tail keyword search (longer than 16 words). If your negative keyword follows the 16th word, Google may still show your advertisement. Additionally, negative keywords won’t match expansions.

2. Find similar search terms to omit

One of the best practices for creating a new negative keyword list is to look for search terms that have similarities to your keywords but may cater more towards consumers searching for a different product or service. Your initial keyword research will help you uncover queries that use your keywords but lack relevancy. 

For instance, the home security brand Ring may utilize negative keywords to eliminate advertising efforts from appearing in searches for engagement rings, pool rings, or other homonyms that the algorithm may not distinguish between due to vague search engine requests.

3. Understand the keywords you currently rank for

In addition to using Google searches as the basis of your negative keyword list, understanding what search terms gain you the most organic traffic can help you save money and further tailor your list.

By using GSC Insights or another keyword tracking tool, you can omit keywords from your Google Ads campaigns that you rank for organically. You can also use your highest ranking keywords and highest-traffic pages to better understand your target audience.

Does it matter when I start implementing a negative keyword strategy?

Your negative keyword research will be very similar to the processes you go through for regular keywords for all intents and purposes. It will be ongoing and may require adjustments from time to time, depending on Google trends. In a PPC campaign, negative keyword research is typically carried out on a weekly basis. 

To maximize the effect of your continuous negative keyword research, you may consider matching your reevaluations to dips in your conversion rate.

Your website’s conversion rate is a tell-tale sign of how effectively your keyword usage (and web design) operates. A sizeable decrease in your quality score or conversion rate indicates that your ads are being shown in response to irrelevant queries. One of the best practices for supporting the conclusions derived from your conversion rate is to examine your bounce rate. Bounce rate can help determine whether or not you have been catering to the right target audience. 

Implementing a Negative Keyword Strategy

There are two primary methods of strategizing and implementing negative keyword research. One occurs prior to launching your PPC campaign–the other occurs after.

Proactive Negative Keyword Research

Proactive negative keyword research takes place prior to the launch of a PPC campaign. To effectively conduct proactive negative keyword research, you will need to scour the market for irrelevant queries that your ad may appear on. 

You can also use SearchAtlas’s Keyword Researcher tool to identify related search terms or Focus Terms that do not apply to your business. These are likely irrelevant keywords that Google will associate in relation to your offering. 

Here’s an example:

1. If you sell ski goggles, you would input “ski goggles” into the search bar.
2. Modify your location if you only want to target a specific location.

3. After your results appear, you can select View All under Suggested.

4. Then, identify common keywords that would not apply to your offering. Take special note for those with a high CPC since they will drain your Google Ads campaign account the quickest. 

5. After, you can then add these to your negative keyword lists.

Then, make a negative list of specific words to set ahead of the PPC campaign launch. Proactively obtaining a search term report and creating a list of negative keywords can help you save money on meaningless clicks and prevent unnecessary blows to your quality score.

Reactive Negative Keyword Research

Anytime after a PPC campaign has gone live, your negative keyword research is considered to be reactive. This strategy is referred to as reactive because it involves creating a negative keyword list in response to the conditions your PPC ads have identified. 

Within the week of your PPC ad launch, you should begin to mine search query reports in your GSC Insights account. Navigate to the Top Keywords tools, then scroll down. In your  Top Keywords List, you will find a report of all the keywords and keyword phrases you’re ranking for.  Identify any keywords that garner strong impressions but low click-through rates (CTRs). 

Make a list of keywords that fall into this category and choose the ones with the most dramatic metrics to add to your negative keyword list.

Are negative keyword lists effective for display or video campaigns?

In short, yes, but it is essential to keep in mind that negative keywords operate differently in the realm of Google Display Network and Video campaigns. 

Similar to how negative keywords work for PPC ads and other search campaigns, they can help avoid targeting unrelated websites and videos. However, negative keyword lists are not as exact on the Display Network as they may be on Google’s search network.

How do they differ?

The occasional appearance of advertisements is possible, despite exclusions. Firstly, there is a cap for negative keyword lists associated with video campaigns. Your negative keyword list cannot exceed 5,000. Although, it is generally not a good idea to exceed that amount for other types of search campaigns either. 

Excessive usage of negative keywords can harm your SEO efforts by over-restricting your ad reach. To avoid damaging ramifications of negative keyword overuse, you may consider implementing content exclusions and adjusting your site category options.

How to Implement Negative Search Terms within Your Google Ads Account

Knowing how to form your list and implement an overarching negative keyword strategy is great, but it’s only helpful if you know how to input your list into your Google Ads account. Here are the steps for entering your negative keywords into Google Ads:

1. After signing into your Google Ads account, you will select the keywords tab on the left page menu. 
2. Under the keywords tab, you will find an option to toggle negative keywords with a plus (+) button. 
3. Clicking this button will prompt you to apply a new negative keyword list or modify an existing one. 
4. This is where you can add and change keywords regardless of whether they are ad-group level or campaign-level.

Selecting Ad-Group Level vs Campaign-Level

Making this distinction is as simple as selecting your specific campaign or ad group before adding your keywords. 

Save to new or existing list

If you are creating a new list, you can check the box marked “save to new or existing list” and add a name for the list. This step is significant for businesses with multiple campaigns or ad groups. If you are only modifying an existing negative keyword list, you will check the same box but select your existing list. 

Whichever route you take, remember to click save after to keep your modifications.

What else should you know?

It will be most beneficial for you to add a single word per line, ensuring that your negative keywords do not overlap with the regular ones. This error can be detrimental to your campaign as it may cause your advertisements not to show. 

When adding negative keywords to a search campaign, you will have the option to select a match type (phrase match, broad match, etc.).

For Video and Display campaigns

If you are creating a negative keyword list for a Display or Video campaign, you will be restricted to using exact match keywords. In this case, the match type will be selected automatically, and you will not have the option to change it. 

Using Existing Negative Keywords Lists

Once you have created negative keywords lists, you may find that they are usable across multiple campaigns or ad groups. If this is the case, Google Ads makes it simple to apply your list anywhere you see fit. Here’s how:

1. Select the option that reads “use negative keyword list.” 
2. Then, browse your existing campaigns to select the one you would like to apply your negative list to. 
3. If there are multiple applicable negative keyword lists, check the boxes of each list before applying. 
4. Then, click save to lock in your choices.

How to Add and Remove Negative Keywords Lists from Campaigns

After monitoring your search results, you may find that some of your negative keywords lists are working better than others. If you ever need to remove negative keywords lists from your campaigns, you will need to:

1. Navigate to the Campaigns tab through the left page menu. 
2. Once you have arrived, you will find a list of your active campaigns with checkboxes next to each one.
3. Check the boxes of each campaign you would like to modify and click “edit,” then select “edit targeting.” 
4. To add, select the option titled “add negative keyword lists,” check the box next to each list that applies, and select “apply.” 

To remove a negative keyword:

The process above works for removing negative keyword lists. The only exception to these processes is smart display campaigns. To edit or exclude negative keyword lists from these campaigns, you will need to adjust them from the smart display campaigns menu manually.

The Positives About Negative Keywords

Overall, negative keyword lists are a fantastic strategy for circumnavigating the fees associated with poorly targeted PPC advertising. However, implementing negative keywords requires mindfulness regarding the volume of your keyword list. Since search and PPC campaigns do not have the same 5,000-word limitation as display and video campaigns do, you will have to use your discretion. Utilizing negative keywords is about balance and reflection.

Use your search term reports to guide you, and keep in mind that narrowing your target audience will result in fewer impressions. Although your impression levels may dip, your conversion rate will likely rise since you will be gearing your advertising efforts solely towards consumers who are most likely to engage meaningfully.

Meaningful engagements are defined as website visitors that participate in desired actions. Desired actions vary from company to company but usually manifest in the form of transactions or, at the least, filling out lead generation forms. Whether your approach is proactive or reactive, the best practice for using negative keyword lists is to make sure you only implement negative keyword phrases or words backed by your SEO research data.

The post What Are Negative Keywords & How Should You Use Them? appeared first on LinkGraph.

So, what is keyword difficulty, and how does keyword difficulty factor into your SEO content strategy? This article will explain how this metric is calculated and how you can use keyword difficulty to improve your website’s search visibility.

What Is Keyword Difficulty?

Keyword difficulty is a metric used in search engine optimization that estimates how much of a challenge it would be to rank for that keyword. Some platforms use the terms SEO difficulty and keyword competition instead of keyword difficulty.

A higher keyword difficulty score indicates how difficult it would be to be displayed on the first page of Google’s search engine results page (SERP). A high score means that there is fierce competition among the websites that are already ranking for that keyword.

Keyword difficulty is measured on a scale of 0 to 100. The closer to 100, the more difficult the keyword would be to rank for. The nearer to 0, the easier the keyword is to rank for.

How Is Keyword Difficulty Calculated?

So, where does this number come from? Most SEO tools use a range of metrics to calculate these metrics. Some of these factors include the competing domains’ ratings and your own domain rating.

At SearchAtlas, we use a weighted formula that takes into account the rating of the domains that rank for the specific keyword, the traffic share that frequents the top-ranking SERPs, and other nuanced factors. Domain rating is calculated by the number and quality of backlinks to that particular website.

Why Does Keyword Difficulty Matter in SEO?

You want to compete in your own weight class. If your competition is a domain rating giant, your content won’t be able to compete–and it will become buried in the SERPs. Keyword difficulty allows you to rank on Google for keywords that you can be discovered for. This, of course, leads to higher traffic and increased conversions.

Furthermore, keyword difficulty allows you to strategically invest your time, money, and other resources in efforts that will pay off. This makes creating an SEO content strategy easier.

How to Choose the Best Keywords for Your Website

Choosing the right keywords is key to SEO success. When selecting what keywords you can rank for, you will want to take into account keyword difficulty, search volume, CPC, and search intent.

1. Evaluate Keyword to Rank & Form a Winning SEO Strategy

The first step to creating a successful SEO content campaign is narrowing down where to focus your efforts. This is part of the beauty of keyword difficulty–it allows you to identify words you can realistically rank for, saving you time, and earning you organic traffic.

Pillar Pages & Cluster Content

Most SEO content specialists suggest starting with pillar pages, then clustering supporting target keywords around them. A pillar page is a long-form guide, landing page, or blog that focuses on a primary or core aspect of your business or website. Cluster content relates to the pillar topic but gives you the opportunity to expand upon smaller details or aspects of the pillar topic.

You should have a handful of pillar pages that relate to your industry. You can add cluster content as needed and as new keyword opportunities arise. 

A pillar structure allows Google’s web crawlers to more easily assess your website’s semantic content and give you kudos for overall topical depth.

For example, if you run a spa, your pillar topics will feature the primary aspects of your business. These may be massage, skincare, acupuncture, hot stone treatments, and waxing. From there, you can expand upon the topic. For example, you can have cluster content pieces for the benefits of each individual type of massage.

Once you’ve defined your pillar topics, you can then begin to create cluster content ideas based on keyword research.

2. Perform Keyword Research

With established pillar topics, you can begin your keyword research for your content clusters. When performing your research, your goal is to find keywords, or search terms, that are the most relevant to your business and that you will be able to rank for. This will require research. 

Often the simplest way to choose keywords is to list subtopics for your pillar pages. Then, plug those topics into a keyword research tool to explore potential keyword choices.

The SearchAtlas SEO suite allows you to quickly perform research and nail down your supporting keywords. With the software suite, the Keyword Discovery tool is an excellent choice for this step.

Simply type what keyword you want to research into the search box. Then, explore suggested keywords by viewing all. If you have a brick-and-mortar business or only ship within one geographic zone, you will want to refine your keyword location.

Review the list of keywords and select keywords by Search Volume (SV) and Pay-Per-Click Difficulty (PPCD)–which is similar to keyword difficulty but takes into account using a paid campaign. 

Select keywords with a difficulty score that is lower than your domain rating or domain authority. Keep in mind the low competition keywords have low difficulty scores. This ensures you have the best chance of appearing in the search results for that keyword. Watch this video for more information on how to use Keyword Difficulty and Domain Authority in your keyword selection.

3. Turn Your Research into Keyword Optimized Content

Once you have a list of keywords you want to create cluster pages around, you can use SEO content creation tools to optimize for those keywords.

In the SearchAtlas suite, navigate to the Content Assistant tool. Then select create a new article. Enter your selected keyword into the Add keyword field. The Content Assistant will run that keyword through our proprietary analyses and display the keyword’s

• Search Volume (SV)
• Keyword Difficulty (KD)
• Cost-Per-Click (CPC)

If you hover over the keyword, you can select the graph icon to display a full report of the keyword’s metrics.

You will also find suggested target keywords you can add to the same article. You can add up to 5 target keywords per piece of content. 

From there, you will be given a list of focus terms to include that relate to each particular keyword. These terms help improve the value of your content for search engine algorithms.

SearchAtlas’s Keyword Difficulty Scale

With the keyword researcher tool, you will find the keyword difficulty scale prominently displayed below the keyword you are researching. This scale is color-coded by difficulty level and labels the difficulty score of the particular keyword.

KD Difficulty Scale

0-25 = Easy

26-50 = Average

51-75 = Hard

76-100 = Very Hard

Keyword Difficulty Tools

A simple search will result in a wide array of keyword difficulty score tools. While each software will use a slightly different method of calculating keyword difficulty scores or keyword difficulty metrics, you will gain insight from whichever you choose. When comparing competitor software, keep in mind that you want to choose the best for your overall SEO needs. This often includes:

• An intuitive user interface, including a keyword overview
• A reliable keyword research tool that displays volume, keyword difficulty (KD), PPC, and KW competitors
• The ability to change keyword difficulty metrics location to another country or region
• Page authority for competing URLs and domain authority scores
• Backlinks profile analysis
• Which keywords should appear in headings
• Content idea suggestions based on keywords
• A keyword mosaic to easily visualize how your competitors use your targeted keywords
• A content creation tool to ensure your content is optimized for search results potential and content quality

SearchAtlas as a Keyword Difficulty Tool

SearchAtlas offers a full suite of SEO tools, including a range of tools to help users select competitive keywords that they have the highest chance of appearing in the top organic search results for.

In SearchAtlas, you will find:

• The SEO Content Assistant for optimizing based on the right keywords. 
• Content Ideas aids you in planning content that engages your target audience. 
• The Content Researcher displays your ranking potential for keywords, KD, a terms grid, keyword discover, the content score for top-ranking URLs, SV, CPC, readability and word count for your competition, and domain rating.
• The Keyword Researcher tool streamlines the keyword research process and helps you understand your keywords’ KD.

Free Keyword Difficulty Tools & Free Keyword Checkers

There are a plethora of free keyword difficulty software choices available, including the Keyword Research Tool and the SEO Content Assistant. With a 7-day free trial, you can determine if SearchAtlas is the best keyword tool for you.

Keyword Difficulty & Your Website

With the right keywords, you can take your content from underperforming and undiscoverable to Google’s first page of search results. Become the author of your site’s future by taking the next step toward mastering keyword selection, page authority, and SERP rankings. SearchAtlas makes keyword difficulty metrics easy to understand and guides you through the steps of producing the best content in your niche.

The post What is Keyword Difficulty & How Does It Affect Your SEO appeared first on LinkGraph.

And in the age of digital marketing, being discoverable on the world’s biggest search engines is not just helpful but necessary. So, how can your business go from invisible to visible? This guide will help you better understand what search visibility is and how it works, as well as provide you with some techniques to help your website gain greater search visibility.

What Is Search Visibility?

Search visibility or “site visibility” is a score shown as a percentage. This score represents how often your website will be seen and clicked on by people Googling any of the keywords you rank for. While just an estimate based on a formula, search visibility indicates how your website performs compared to other websites ranking for the same keywords.

Also referred to as search engine visibility and SEO visibility, this number offers a numeric way to measure your website’s search engine presence.

Your visibility number or visibility % is a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) that shows an estimate of how many people will view your website compared to your competition for the same keywords.

LinkGraph includes search visibility as a line graph and percentage in our GSC Insights overview page, so you can easily track your website’s organic search performance.

While the metric can be a bit more complicated than other SEO factors, the principle behind it is simple:

The higher your visibility score, the more people are likely to see your website in search engine results. If you have a 100% visibility score, it means that your website ranks as #1 in search results for every keyword your website appears for.

The lower your visibility score, the less frequently people see your website in search results. This is also to say that the lower your visibility %, the lower your pages appear in Google’s results on average.

Why Does Search Visibility Matter?

The word “visibility” can be a bit misleading when it comes to the value of this metric. While search visibility implies being seen by people using Google, it’s important to note that the number correlates with how many clicks you can expect your website to receive. And those clicks can equate to sales and greater momentum for climbing search engine results pages (SERPs) over time.

How Is Search Visibility Calculated?

So, how do SearchAtlas or other SEO platforms calculate search visibility? This metric is calculated based on your website’s keywords and where your pages rank among other keyword results. Unlike many other SEO metrics, this one allows you to see how your website is performing overall.

Here’s how it’s calculated:

1. First, we take all the keywords your website is tracking for. We apply a number to each that corresponds to how likely your page will be seen and clicked on among competing search results. 
2. Then, all of those search engine ranking click-through likelihood numbers are added up.
3. Once totaled, the number is then divided by the number of keywords your URL ranks for. This results in the average your site will be seen, or its search visibility. 

Corresponding Values by SERP Ranking

Where does the corresponding value in step one come from? We use Google’s prediction of the likelihood your site will be clicked on by searchers. This aspect of the metric is called the click-through rate (CTR). 

Google also takes into account how many people see your link in the search results and actually click on it. Google estimates that 31% of all people will click on the first result from an organic search. Therefore each of your URLs with a #1-position in Google search results will equate to 31%.

Position two has a CTR of 15.7% of people, and so on.

Calculating Search Visibility Example:

One of the easiest ways to illustrate how the search visibility formula works is to work through it once with simplified numbers. 

So, let’s calculate a search visibility percentage together.

• If a website has 10 keywords it ranks for in Google’s top 100 SERPs, and 5 of them are in position 1 and 5 of them are in position 3, we would multiply 5 by 28.5% and 5 by 11%. This would result in 142.5% and 55%.
• Next, we would add these together to get 197.5%.
• Because the website tracks for a total of 10 keywords, we would divide 197.5% by 10.
• The result is search visibility of 19.75%

Calculating Search Visibility Change

As we pointed out, search engine visibility is a great KPI for measuring the success of your SEO campaigns. If your visibility trends upward, your campaigns are successful. To illustrate, let’s take the above example, and recalculate it with a change in SERP rankings.

If the above website had one of their KW rankings drop to position 2, and the 5 that were in the 3rd position move to the 2nd position, the equation would change to this:

[4(28.5%) + 6(15.7%)] ÷ 10 = 20.82%

After calculating your new search visibility, you will subtract your new number from the previous number–the difference is a positive or negative change in your search visibility.

In our example (20.82% – 19.75%), the result is a search visibility increase of 1.07%–which means your SEO efforts are paying off!

What if I’m seeing an increase in my search visibility but not seeing an increase in conversions or traffic?

There are a few important things to keep in mind regarding search visibility:

1. Visibility is not the real number of people that click on your website.
2. SEO often has a slow-burn effect. So be patient.
3. If you see an increase in traffic but not conversions, you may want to improve your on-page content and design.

What Is Ranking Position?

A ranking position or SERP position is where your URL appears in the long list of results for Google searches. Search visibility only takes into account keywords where your site appears in the top 100  search results.

What is Organic Traffic?

Organic traffic is web traffic that arrives on your website from a search engine query. However, organic traffic does not include traffic from paid ads.

One of the greatest benefits of improving your ranking in organic search results is that SEO drives traffic to your site in an affordable way. (In fact, SearchAtlas gives you an estimate of the economic value of the amount of traffic that arrives on your page just from organic searches).

What Pages on My Website Count as Organic Traffic?

Any page that can be found through Google or another search engine counts as organic traffic. These pages are entry points to your website. Organic traffic can find your website through organic results of nearly any page on your website, including your:

• Homepage
• Blog post pages
• Resource or reference pages
• Landing pages
• Sales, services, or product pages
• About or contact

How to Check Your Search Visibility

Checking your website’s site visibility or search visibility is easy with SearchAtlas’s GSC Insights tool. All you have to do is

1. Login. Then select the GSC Insights tool Overview dashboard.
2. Scroll down to the Site Performance.
3. The Site Visibility graph shows your website’s search visibility percentage and historic site visibility performance.

Measuring Your SEO Efforts

Search visibility is one of the best factors for measuring the results or success of an SEO campaign or PPC campaign. With SearchAtlas, you’re able to track your results over the course of a campaign. With dates clearly visible across the y-axis, you can track your progress.

An upward trending line, despite day-to-day fluctuations, indicates that your site visibility is increasing.

A downward trending line indicates that your site is becoming less visible in Google results.

To find a specific date, hover your mouse over the graph. The date will appear. This can help you track your site visibility against changes in Google’s algorithms and other search engine ranking factors.

Keep in mind as you improve your content, you will boost your relevancy and the number of keywords you rank for. As you climb the SERPs, more people will visit your website and begin backlinking to your content. This will grow your website’s domain authority (or domain rating) and make huge differences in your SEO visibility.

Why Is My Search Visibility Zero?

If your website is not ranking for any keywords, your site visibility score will be 0.0%. This is likely because you have yet to target any keywords or implement a strategic SEO campaign.

Main Factors That Affect Search Visibility

One question that often comes up when discussing search visibility is “how does search engine visibility” relate to Search Engine Optimization? In the simplest terms, the better your search engine optimization, the higher your site visibility and visibility score.

So, the same factors that go into improving your search engine optimization increase your website’s search visibility. 

The most influential factors that affect your site visibility include:

• Your SERP ranking positions
• Keyword optimization
• Google’s algorithms

Other Factors That Can Increase or Decrease Search Visibility

While keywords, your SERP positions, and Google’s algorithms are the strongest factors that affect your search visibility, there is a multitude of small factors that go into how your page ranks and for what keywords. 

These SEO elements include:

• Local search visibility
• Local mobile visibility
• Paid search engine visibility (PPC)
• Page load times
• Visual appeal of your website
• Ease of use of your website
• Value of content on your website

How to Increase Your Website’s Search Visibility

Of course, the thing everyone wants to know is how to grow their website’s visibility on Google. There may be no quick-fix for a low site visibility score. But like training for a marathon, you want to take consistent, incremental steps to improve your website and individual pages’ search engine performance strategically. 

We recommend you focus your effort on these tactics:

1. Target Keywords on Page 2 of Google’s Results

Most websites track hundreds, even thousands of keywords. This makes it impossible to target each and every one. However, your visibility will increase exponentially if you can move your URLs from page 2 of the search engine results to page one. 

So, within SearchAtlas, go to Top Keywords under the GSC Insights tool. Then, sort by position, and identify pages that are ranking between positions 11 and 13. 

Then, improve your content on these pages using the Content Assistant tool.

2. Identify and Use Long-Tail Keywords And LSI Words

Long-tail and Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) keywords are often less competitive. This makes ranking for them a bit easier and allows you to target a cluster of keywords all at once.

Furthermore, 15.5% of all search queries on Google are first-time-ever Googled search terms, which means that people are always coming up with new ways to find what they’re looking for–and this gives you a better opportunity to rank.

What are long-tail keywords?

Long-tail keywords are phrases that people Google to find specific keyword results. Long-tail keyword phrases are usually three or more words in one search query. “Running shoes” would be an example of a standard keyword, whereas, “best running shoes for new long-distance runners” would be a long-tail keyword.

What are LSI keywords?

Google is very good at figuring out related terms to specific keywords. The related terms are considered Latent Semantic Indexing keywords.

For example, if someone were to Google “marathon training,” Google may suggest that you also look at “marathon training courses” or “marathon training tracking systems.” 

SearchAtlas provides users with both long-tail keywords and LSI keywords in the Content Assistant’s Terms menu.

3. Check Your Website’s Mobile Friendliness

Everyone has a smartphone nowadays, so it’s only natural that you optimize your website for mobile devices. Doing so will allow smartphone users to access your site with ease. Search engines use mobile-friendliness as one of their ranking factors. This is why it appears as part of the page experience report in Google Search Console and why we include it in our GSC Insights overview report.

Some of the best practices for mobile optimization include ensuring your webpage’s speed is suitable for mobile devices. Additionally, you should use mobile-friendly UX and pop-ups for advertising. Also, you may want to use compressed images so they load faster and size properly on any device.

Moreover, you should optimize your mobile-friendly content for the visually impaired. This includes using descriptive but brief alt text for your images and keywords that can easily be searched on voice search. To verify if your website is mobile-friendly, you can enter your URL into this Google tool to check. Making your web pages more mobile-friendly has the power to increase your rankings significantly because Google only includes mobile pages in its index.

4. Update Your Meta Tags

For this one, we will ask you to take a step back and think about the thought process you go through when using Google for a webpage. When the search results load, you likely skim the top few results and make a decision on which webpage best fits your need.

That information you skim–the title and short description beneath the title are your meta tags. If you improve these tags, you can improve your click-through rate, which will improve your ranking and visibility.

5. Invest in Backlinking

The more websites that link to your site, the more valuable Google’s algorithms perceive your content to be–and the higher your website will appear in their search results. So, using a backlinking service or DIY backlinking with guest posting to websites with high domain ratings with links to your page can help your website gain traction in Google’s results.

6. Increase Your Visitors’ Time on Page

One of the biggest signs of the quality of your content is how long visitors stay on your web pages. As people scroll down your page, interact with elements, and stay within your website, Google is taking note. And these metrics are rolled into how you rank in the SERPs.

So, improving your content’s readability, adding more media, and creating content with more value can boost your ranking and overall search visibility.

7. Check Internal Linking

Internal links are a wonderful way to keep users within your website. In some ways, your internal linking is like a game of Shoots-and-Ladders where the final destination is a confirmed purchase.

However, when a user comes across a broken internal link, your users may decide to go elsewhere. This increases your exit rate and has a negative effect on your webpage rankings.

Furthermore, when Google’s crawlers get stuck on a broken internal link, they’re likely to stop crawling your page and give your page a demerit. 

Fixing these issues can improve your search rankings. SearchAtlas makes identifying broken links easy with the Link Report of the Site Audit tool.

8. Audit Your Site

Page speed has become an influential factor in how your page will rank as a result of Google’s Core Web Vitals rollout.

Using the Page Explorers tool in Search Atlas, you will want to check your website’s health and speed. Click on the View button to begin cleaning up the biggest issues first to improve your ranking.

9. Meet and Exceed Security Standards

One of the simplest ways to improve your SERP positions is to safeguard your visitors with digital safety measures. 

Technical SEO techniques that can boost your website’s security levels include applying Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) to establish encrypted links between a web server and browser’s online communication. 

You can also eliminate 404 pages and broken links by redirecting these pages or populating them with relevant content. 

Additionally, be sure to eliminate bad backlinks that can negatively affect your search rankings. Spoiler: SearchAtlas is developing a Toxic Backlinks tool to help website owners more easily identify toxic backlinks.

Search Visibility and Your Website

Search visibility is a visibility metric or calculation based on where your web pages appear among search engine rankings. Also referred to as SEO visibility, this number takes the average position of the keywords your site ranks for and shows you how likely a person Googling any keyword you track for is to find your website.

Improving your SEO visibility requires a multi-faceted approach to the technical and on-page side of your SEO. As you check tasks off your list, don’t forget to give them time to take effect then track your progress with SearchAtlas.

Become discoverable by tackling any factors that are negatively affecting your website’s search engine visibility with SearchAtlas. This easy-to-use tool allows you to track each indicator of your website’s SEO performance, including your

• Google position tracking for individual keywords
• Top ranking keywords
• Top performing pages
• Search visibility score
• Domain authority or domain rating
• Performance in relation to algorithm updates

Need assistance with your SEO strategy? LinkGraph is an industry leader in SEO and ready to help.

The post Search Visibility Guide appeared first on LinkGraph.